A Detour Home
by smalllatte
Summary: For the first time in a long while, Edward Elric can see the tip of hope. It has been months, chasing after nothing but an urban myth through the whole country, searching for a way to home. Finally, here he came, a shop where wishes can come true. And from there he starts his new journey.
1. Chapter 1

This is my first time writing fanfiction and posting online. I've always wanted to see Edward travel through dimensions with Tsubasa characters but I couldn't find much stories about it. So I decided to write my own version :)

Disclaimer: I do not own both of the stories.

* * *

 **CHAPTER ONE**

For the first time in a long while, Edward Elric can see the tip of hope. It has been months, chasing after nothing but an urban myth through the whole country, searching for a way to escape, a way to home. Constant traveling is nothing new to Ed. Only this time, his brother no longer walk alongside with him. Finally, here he came, a shop where wishes can come true.

"So, I can make whatever wish I want?" Ed asks once the tea was served, by the boy with glasses who now standing quietly by the entrance, watching the conversation unfold between his employer and the new customer around the dark wood table.

"Yes," the woman reply without a trace of emotion, her deep red eyes reveal nothing to him, "as long as you pay an equal price in return."

No matter how absurd it sounds to believe _magic_ exists and his wish can be granted by paying a price, Ed supposes it is fair enough. It's basically a sort of equivalent exchange. He only prays, silently — to a God he doesn't want to believe — that the witch would be more humanized about the price than Truth himself.

Ed slowly picks up his tea with his gloved hand. He gulps down his bubbling hope and nervousness to allow himself a moment to think. He is so close now. So close to his home. But the problem is whether he has enough to pay. The possibility of failing, after he has come such a long way makes his stomach churn.

 _But it doesn't really matter._

Because he knows he will pay all that he can to get back to his brother.

Metal hand clenches under the table, Ed takes a deep breath and utters the words that are held in his heart for nearly two years.

"I want to go back home, to where I come from."

He expected confusion from the witch, but he sees none of it. _She knows what I meant._ The woman in the purple kimono answers. "Your wish, even if you pay the dearest thing to you, it would not be enough."

Ed's stomach drops. _But there's something, something in her voice…_

"But?" Ed holds his breath and whispers.

A slight smile appears and she says, "I had a few customers who made similar wishes as yours a couple days back."

Ed sees surprise crossed the dark-haired boy's face. _What..?_

"You mean, there're other people wanted to go back to my world?" His home is a world away, separated by a large stone Gate. Surely there wouldn't be another alchemist foolish enough to perform the taboo and came here, right?

"No," the owner of the shop slowly puts down her tea, "there're others also hoped to cross to other dimensions."

"Dimensions?" Ed frowned.

She gazes at him, before her blood-red lips tug at the corner.

"There is more than just a few worlds exist in our universe, Mr. Elric."

Ed's eyes widened.

"There are numerous, uncountable dimensions, each of them contains people you may acquaintance with, and living totally different lives. There may be also another you and me," she explains. "I am sure you have experienced this in first hand."

 _Right._ He had — once, before this mess occurred; when he was still at Amestris — Dante tossed him to another reality where wars prevailed. Germany. He saw another version of himself where he kept short blonde hair, wear white shirt with a brown vest instead of his signature red coat. He hadn't expected there would be more worlds than that.

"That's why you knew my name, you met my counterpart here?"

"Those were quite unique features of yours, golden hair and eyes," she answers with an unreadable smile. "And people usually called me the dimension witch."

Ed contemplates her words and asks the most important question to him.

"If I can't pay the price, then how?"

"You don't have to pay the whole price on your own."

That's when Ed hears the sliding of the door and realizes the boy at their side had slipped out of the room at some point, now returning with a black fluffy doll in his arms.

A twitching and smiling black fluffy doll.

Ed thinks his world is getting weirder and weirder.

* * *

"So I guess we are off then?" the man with light blond hair, stops a few steps ahead and turns around, looking back to his companions.

The taller man behind him also stops. Instead of answering, he glances back to the city they have stayed for the week. It's their first stop. To be honest, it's a good place to start, in a relatively peaceful environment with a generous host, they could sort themselves out before embarking on this seemingly endless, uncertain journey.

The boy beside him tightens his grip on the sleeping girl in his arms, shoulders slouching. Sakura — the girl who had regained consciousness after recovering a bit of her memories — are still weak. Kurogane has yet to speak to her beside brief introduction. She fell asleep again and has not been awake since.

"Don't look down," the sudden deep baritone jolts the boy's out of his thought. The ninja has his arms crossed; red piercing eyes looking steadily ahead.

"If you have something you must do, then look forward."

There's a moment when Syaoran just watches Sakura's sleeping face silently. Then he looks up and nods with a look of determination.

 _That's more like it._ The kid need to be tough — if he's going to accomplish what he wanted to in this trip — he need a strong mind to overcome every hardship lying ahead of them. Kurogane drop his gaze and is suddenly met with bright blue eyes, whose owner looks annoyingly please. Kurogane frowned, earning a raise of the eyebrow from the wizard.

"Let's go then! " the white bun chirped, jumping up and down on Fai's hands, "Mokona is looking toward a great adventure —"

Without warning, the eyes of the fluffy doll-like creature going round and wide.

"MEKYO!"

All heads turned to the Mokona with looks of confusion and alarm.

 _What's going on?_ Kurogane is about to call forth his Kudan when the ruby on the creature's forehead starts to glow. A ray of light comes out and slowly morphs into a projection. The image of the dimension witch stands in front of the four travelers.

"Yuuko!" exclaimed Mokona.

"Mokona." the woman replies with a slight smile. Instead of the outfit they saw she wore back at her shop, she is now dressed in purple kimono adorned by intricate butterflies embroidery, hair elegantly tied up, "I see that you guys are to set off to the next world."

"Witch. What do you want now?" Kurogane growls.

"Kurotan, there's no need to be rude." Fai chimes in, grinning.

A vein pops on Kurogane's head. "Stop calling me that."

"I am not here to want anything from you. Unless you guys have new wishes?" an eyebrow raised, Yuuko's sweep her gaze over the group before continuing, "I am here to inform you a change regarding your travel arrangement."

There's a pause before anyone speaks.

"A change?" Syaoran asks.

A smile tugs at the corner of the witch's lips and Kurogane got a bad feeling for this. He would almost say the dimension witch is amused.

"You have a new traveling companion."

* * *

Ed tumbles when he suddenly collides with the solid ground. Disoriented, he looks up and blinked. Four pairs of eyes stare right back at him. There're two men who're freaking tall and a boy looks to be his age holding an unconscious girl. Then there's the creature he has just seen moments ago, only this one is white in color, and with a red gem on its forehead.

The blond man bends down and extends his hand. "You must be the one who is joining us."

"Erm, yeah," Ed grasps his hand and pulls himself up. "Thanks."

"Fai. D. Fluorite, wizard from Celes." the man points a gloved finger to himself with a big smile. "Nice to meet you!"

Now that Ed is standing, he can see Fai is dressed in a long white coat with thick fur and blue embroideries. _Wizard robe maybe?_ The idea of magic still sounds dumb to Ed. But he can hardly deny its existence, after being swallowed whole by a talking rabbit and come out in one piece.

"My name is a bit long. You can call me Fai." The blond added with a wink.

"Ed, Edward Elric, from Amestris." Ed returns the smile and adds after a moment of hesitation. "I'm an alchemist."

"Alchemist! So Ed can do magic like Fai?" Ed catches the white creature, Mokona — the witch has mentioned its name — when it suddenly bound to him from Fai's shoulder.

"I don't really know about magic, but alchemy is science." Ed replies, "Hey, you look the same as the black fluffy rabbit I've just met."

"Mokona is Mokona!" Mokona said, bouncing up and down on Ed's gloved hand. "Mokona brought you here and Mokona will be your guide from now on!"

"The names are quite confusing."

"I've thought the black bun will come along with you,"

Ed looks towards the other man — or it's more like looking up. The man is just ridiculously tall. The black cape he's wearing covers the glimmer of his dark armor underneath. Along with the red helmet, he looks like he's coming out of a battlefield. The moment his red gaze meets golden, Ed's almost startled. _Maybe that's not a totally wrong guess,_ he thinks. Because it kind of reminds him of Scar, and it's more than just the color of the eyes.

"I'm Kuro — ." the man nods.

"Kurotan." Fai speaks up.

" — gane."

There's a moment of silence before chaos erupted. Kurogane has called up a sword out of nowhere and chasing Fai down the hill, for whom is grinning and laughing all the way. Ed watched the scene unfold with utter amusement.

"Kurogane-san doesn't like being called those names," the boy with chestnut hair explains with an apologetic smile, "I'm Syaoran, and this is Sakura."

"I know what that's like," Ed gives out a small laugh, causing a raised eyebrow from Syaoran. "Is she okay? She seems a little pale."

"Saku —," Syaoran looks down. "Princess Sakura has lost her memories in an incident."

Ed eyes widened a little. "Amnesia?"

"It's not as simple as that," Syaoran tightens his hold on the girl. "They are scattered around different worlds as feathers. We are traveling to collect them back."

There's something more in Syaoran's tone that is almost sad and wistful. And before Ed can ask, Fai — who has returned from the chasing, Kurogane seething by his side — start explaining how they have met each other in the witch's shop. About how the girl had nearly died from losing all her memories. How the feather was found and the chaos before they can return it back to Sakura.

"So, we won't be able to move on to other worlds, before Sakura —"

"Don't worry about it," Ed decides to cut him off. "I can help."

Syaoran looks up surprised.

 _We are going to get them back, brother._

 _We will get our bodies back, both of us. You can't do this alone! We are going to search the stone together.  
_

"You'd need all the help you can get, right?" Ed shrugs, taking his gaze back from the city to his soon-to-be travel companions. "Besides, it's not like I have anything else to do before I can get back to my world."

Syaoran looked Ed to the eyes with a grateful smile. "Thank you."

"Oh, you mentioned there's something like magic in this world?" Ed asks, recalling what Fai has said earlier.

"You mean the Kudan?"

"That smog the tall guy had called out and changed into a sword? I thought it's some form of magic."

The said 'tall guy' gave him a slightly annoyed look before calling his sword out again. "What do you want?"

"Ah, I just want to try something." Looking at his own brown flapping coat, Ed takes a deep breath before clapping his hands together. For a second, Ed almost think it doesn't work. Then blue sparks dance around his hands and he presses them to his coat. Brown fabric gradually morphs into a deep shade of red with a black curling symbol at the back. Seeing his piece of work, Ed smirks.

"Hyuu, that's pretty impressive." grinning, Fai step forward to inspect his now red coat.

"It's been awhile I can do alchemy." Ed smiles. He hadn't been able to use alchemy in Japan when he was finding the wish shop. He had a few theories about the reason but they were just wild guesses. Now, it seems he was right.

Kurogane gives out a small snort before retracting his Kudan. "Can we go on to the next world now?"

"Right, I am ready." Ed glanced back to the group with a wide grin.

"Let's go, everyone! Mokona will be your guide!"

 _I am on my way back home._

Ed's gloved hand brush against his own right wrist; he can almost feel its metallic chill beneath the fabrics.

 _I am coming back to you now, Alphonse._

As silver tendrils close around him, Ed closes his eyes, his red coat flapping around him. Maybe this would be a long journey. Maybe there's still a long way before he can see his younger brother. Still, he can't help but feel a little relieved that this time, he's on his way, and he won't be traveling alone anymore.


	2. Chapter 2

Thank you so much for reading this! I can't express how happy I was when I read every one of the reviews. And to FairySinGirl: Yes, Ed is still a pipsqueak in this, unfortunately (laugh). I started this out of fun and I'm glad you guys like it. I am still struggling how to write all of the imaginations in my head out nicely though. So sorry for the long wait, here is the next chapter:)

* * *

 **CHAPTER TWO**

To say Ed has traveled a lot is probably an understatement, practically he has been in constant traveling since the day he decided to take the State Alchemist Exam. He's used to it by now. But for now and then, he still thinks of his very first trip back when he was a kid.

Resemboo is a small town in the countryside, not too far from any major cities, but far enough that he'd never gone out of his town when he was young. Sheep and wool, that's all they had. Everything was preciously innocent and pleasant. The first time, was their trip to Duplin with teacher. He and his brother, stared in awe at the passing scenery on the train, while Teacher sat across their seats with her eyes closed. Wind gently stroke he and his brother's skins, brushed their blond hair, touched the hem of his neck under the sunset in far horizon. With the rhythmic sounds of wheels and the occasional whistle ahead. He was mesmerized. For just a moment, he forgot everything. For one instance, he believed he's got his future in his hands.

It was such a long time ago.

"So," Fai tilts his head and asks. "You are heading back to this Resemboo town of yours?"

"Em," Ed jerks his mind back to the present, he has zoned out in the middle of a conversation. "I used to travel a lot," - _and haven't been back for God knows how long -_ "But yeah. It's a nice little village. With sheep and all."

"That's cool." Fai grins, who sits beside him on the floor sipping his tea "Celes is a small country. Not as large as Amestris I think, from the way you tell me."

Ed tips his head back to look at the sky above. He's still wrapping his head around the idea of endless universes. It's interesting, how different places can be. And speaking of that —

"Actually," Ed turns to Fai. "Do all of you guys speak Japanese or is there a translation spell or something?"

"Japanese?" Kurogane speaks up the first time through the whole conversation. The ninja is sitting on the rooftop, hands grabbing hammer and woods, apparently attempting to fix the large hole on the ceiling that is showing the sky. He is looking down at Ed with a confused frown.

"You can speak Japanese?"

Blinking confusedly, _So they didn't know what language I was speaking?_ Before he scrambles to answer the question.

"Fluent, I guess? I was stuck in Japan for a while before I found the witch." Ed explains, suppressing a grimace. The last two years was — well, ripped away from everything he knew and had to make a living for himself from scratch was not easy. His own life belief and masterwork was nothing but a fairytale dead science. He didn't know how long it'd take him to find a way back, if ever. And not knowing if the reason of all this mess — if his brother is even alive — surely did not help. But anyway, he had picked up the language along the way.

That lead to the conversation about Mokona translation ability, which to be honest, is quite fascinating from Ed's point of view. Will they hear differently if he speaks Amestrian? Probably not. That talking rabbit is certainly a weird creature. How can someone create a living thing with such abilities? Magic maybe. He really hopes nothing sinister is behind the making.

Then they talk about how everyone arrived at the witch shop. Fai, who surprisingly arrive there by himself, is seeking to avoid his own world. Kurogane, on the other hand, is banished from a different Japan and determined to go back.

Just, how many weird people are out there like himself?

Ed keeps his own version as simple as possible: torn from his world and got stuck, that's all. If they know he was being deliberately vague, they didn't comment on it. They all were, being vague that is.

"So," Kurogane says, followed by a loud clang from the hammer. "How long are we staying here?"

"Well, that depends on how is Mokona doing," Fai replies in a cheerful tone and passes a wood board up the roof. "If they can find any clues of Sakura's feathers in this world."

Brows furrowed as he hammering down another nail on the wood, Kurogane asks, "Should the princess be allowed to go out at all? She looks like she's dozing off half the time."

"That's probably caused by her lost memories?" What Kurogane said is true. The girl still looks too weak and barely able to stay awake. But she has Syaoran by her side, who is no doubt determined to protect her.

Fai seems to think over his next words. "Sakura-chan has only got two feathers back. It won't be a surprise if she is a shadow of her past self right now, I think that's why she didn't even question anything about the traveling," he pauses before continues with a more quiet tone. "And even if she found all her feathers, those memories between Syaoran and her are lost forever."

Ed looks down at his tea, letting his golden bangs to cover his eyes. _That's the price to save someone who's the dearest to you._

Dark clouds are gathering in the sky outside. It had been sunny when they arrived in this world. Mokona had dropped them in the middle of a bustling market full of people. And damn, that kick of Syaoran's was cool. When that governor's son — who is a total bastard from what Chunyan had told them and what happened to the poor girl's broken rooftop — appeared out of nowhere and yanked on Sakura's hand. Right, a bastard no doubt. Then there's that weird strong wind that destroyed half the roof, which Ed suspects had a touch of unnatural force, be it magic or alchemy. _This is not going to be a easy trip, is it?_

"Even so, " Fai plops back down next to Ed. "Syaoran-kun is still going to find them all, no matter how far Sakura-chan's feathers were scattered. No matter how hard it is going to be."

"And right now," Fai picks up his tea and takes a sip, " — all that we can do, is to fix the roof and wait for them to come back," letting out a small smile.

The ninja, still sitting on the roof, bristles.

"Then why are you two just sitting there while I am fixing the roof?" Kurogane barks, nearly yelling the last part.

"Hm?" The mage tilts his head.

"I said STOP slacking!" _Yup, definitely yelling now._ Ed wisely keeps his mouth shut and drink his tea.

"Oh!" A perfect innocent look from the wizard. "I just want to watch the way Kuropipi works from here."

Veins popped out on Kurogane's head. _He's going to throw that hammer down the roof now._ Kurogane narrows his eyes - _and oops_ \- changing his target from Fai to Ed.

"What, you kid there. Got anything to say?"

Well, it's Ed's turn to lose his cool.

"Who are you calling sh—?" Ed chokes back the 's' word. Take a deep breath. Don't hit him. Not worth it. It wasn't a crack at his height. The man is _old_ (older than him). And _he has_ _grown_ (a bit). Right, a deep breath.

"Give me the wood," Ed huffs and gets to his feet.

He looks up to the damaged part of the roof and observes. He has never lived in this kind of houses before but he has seen some similar ones in Japan. The witch's shop for one looks a bit like Chunyan house, more refined and styled differently, but similar.

"And hold these." He picks up some small rocks from the garden and passed them to an onlooking Kurogane, before climbing up to roof himself. Fai is watching them with clear amusement but he ignores him. Examining the damage up close, he can see the roof tiles are made of clays. It was blasted off which shows the woodblocks and wooden beams below. Well, they don't have much here, rocks will have to do. Putting the ingredients down, he claps his hands.

The resounding clap echoes the house. Blue sparks dance around as the wood board lost its shape and gradually morphs into the broken beams and woodblocks. Small rocks shaped into tiles, covering them in place.

It's exhilarating, being able to use alchemy again. Even after two years, it still feels as natural as breathing, embracing a lost part of himself. He's glad he didn't lose his touch as he dust his hands off.

Then Ed looks up and sees the corner of the ninja's mouth twitching, and the next moment he is breathing fire from his mouth.

"Why—the— _hell_ you couldn't do that from the start!?"

"I was drinking tea, you giant!" Ed yelled back.

"Stop that bullshit, midget — urmph." Someone fell off the roof.

And Fai laughed.

* * *

"We have tried to overthrow the government but that place is isolated and protected by strong spells," Chunyan says quietly, dipping her head. Surrounding the table, sit the five dimension travelers and the little girl who took them in.

When Syaoran was back with his new clothes with dirt and tears on it, the three stayed home companions were instantly alarmed. He doesn't look to be in any serious injuries but the worry glance Sakura keeps giving Syaoran is a telltale sign of what happened during that scouting around the street. The governor and his son strikes again. Using those Jutsu —the magic this world seems to have — that caught them earlier that day. It looks like it's getting more vicious. And Chunyan will be in great trouble if they don't do something soon.

That leads to them sitting around the table making attack plans.

"But why are they keep targeting us?" Ed asked, drumming his gloved fingers on the table.

"Possibly the same reason as me, they mistook you as the inspectors from Central to report their crimes." Chunyan takes a good look at them. "You guys do look foreign enough."

"We come from very far away," Fai says with a slight smile.

Chunyan gives them a slightly suspicious look before continuing. "That two monsters, they just came out of nowhere one day," she gritted out. "With very strong Jutsu they took the throne and changed the laws, and we have been suffering ever since."

"Sudden strong power," Fai speaks with a contemplated look. "It can be due to the acquisition of something powerful, something that enhances their abilities, right?"

 _Sakura's feather?_

"But the time doesn't add up. We just started the journey like, a week ago?" Syaoran points out.

"Time flows differently in different worlds, remember?" The wizard lets out a wicked smile.

The travelers share a look.

"We are going to that place," Syaoran concludes, with a determined gaze despite Sakura's worried look.

So they settle to strike the bastard's palace tomorrow.

* * *

Edward splashes water on his face and stares at his own reflection in the mirror. He looks tired. Hair drooping around his shoulder and bags under his eyes but that's hardly surprising. He is always tired these days. His bangs are growing a bit too long as well, nearly covering his eyes. He eyes tracked down from his metal shoulder blade to his chest. There, that ugly twisting scar, sitting like a monster right above his heart. He knows if he turns around he would see the same shape crawling at the same place at his back. Gingerly, he raises his left hand to touch it but feels nothing, despite the large amount of pain he remembers he'd suffered at the time when he received that fatal wound. He still has no idea how has he survived that. Too many questions and not enough answers.

Shaking his head, he transmutes his right arm to a blade and starts to trims his golden strands. _No use thinking about it._

When he is satisfied with his hair, he ties back his ponytail and turns to look at the outfit Syaoran had handed to him. They used the money they got from the lottery — which Sakura won three times straight — to buy clothes for all of them. His was a white long garment with buttons, and a brown sleeveless robe coupled with a long piece of dark brown fabrics that tie the whole thing close to his waist.

To be honest, the attire doesn't exactly match with gloves.

Then he guesses that either wearing gloves or removing them will get weird looks all the same anyway. It'd be hard to keep his automails hidden from his travel companions, he knows, with their sleeping arrangement and all. Just maybe — later, he's not sure he wants to deal with any explanations now. Not that he has to give them any, but well, he doesn't want to lie if he can help it. And unlike the good old times, he needs to be extra careful about his automails. He's lacking a mechanic here, he will be _crippled_ if anything happens to them. So yeah, he is leaving his gloves on for now.

He gets changed and heads out to their room. While Chunyan and Sakura share one, all the others are sharing another. Before sliding the door open though, he pauses, and decides to head out to the garden instead. Grabbing the edge of the roof, he heaves himself up onto the roof in one swift motion. No moon today but there are stars.

He is about to sit when he sees someone, hand resting on his pop up knee, sitting on the other side of the rooftop. Kurogane turns his head to look at him.

"Sorry," Ed says, glancing back, not sure if he should go back down or not. "I didn't see you."

"No, it's fine." Kurogane waves his hand, stopping Ed's retreat and look back to the night before him. The man has also changed, from his armor to this country's attire. Must be hard to sleep in those full gear, Ed thinks. Unlike Ed's deep brown layers. Kurogane's appear to be dark blue or black, he can't be sure in the dark.

Glancing around, Ed settles on the other side of the roof, the hole they fixed that morning between them. For a moment, he contemplates to strike a conversation but decides against it. He wonders what is the ninja doing up here and what is on his mind. He watches those flickering soft lights from the houses down the village. And the stars in the sky twinkling. Far in the middle of the town sat the citadel, surrounded by moat and walls.

That's the place. They are going to barge in there tomorrow.

He let out a quiet sigh and close his eyes against the night breeze, sinking in the comfortable silence.


End file.
